The Death of Hope
by Mr. Dot
Summary: A Warp-storm recedes and mighty dominions are found once again by the Imperium of Man. As the 41st Millennium draws to a close and the fates started ten thousand years ago come to a head, souls make battle to secure a future for Humanity. Is it possible for hope to be renewed? Only the Four in the Warp can say...
1. Prologue

_It is the 41st Millennium. For more than a hundred centuries The Emperor has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Terra. He is the Master of Mankind by the will of the Gods, and master of a millon wordls by the might of his inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly die._

 _Yet even in his deathless state, the Emperor continues his eternal vigilance. Mighty battlefleets cross the daemon-infested miasma of the Warp, the only route vetween distant stars, their way lit by the Astronomican, the psychic manifestation of the Emperor's will. Vast armies give battle in his name on uncountable worlds. Greatest amongst his soldiers are the Adeptus Astartes, the Space Marines, bio-engineered super-warriors. Their comrades in arms are legion: the Astra Militarum and countless planetary defence forces, the ever-vigilant Inquisition and the tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus only to name a few. But for all their moltitudes, they are barely enough to hold off the ever-present threat from aliens, heretics, mutants - and worse._

 _To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruellest and most bloody regime imaginable. There are the tales of those times. Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be re-learned. Forget the promise of progress and understanding, for in the grim dark future there is only war. There is no peace amongst the stars, only an eternity of carnage and slaughter, and the laughter of thirsting Gods._

For all its power, the Imperium is constantly at the mercy of the capricious tidings of the daemon-infested Warp. Sudden Warp-squalls can send the mightest of fleets reeling into the unpeakable depths of that metaphysical dimension; mighty Warp-storms can cut off entire sub-sectors from the wider Imperium even for millennia at a Administratum, the mammoth, galaxy-spanning bureaucracy of the Imperium, and the secretive Adeptus Mechanicus kept costant vigilance over the raging Warp-storms, hoping, should ever they wane and disappear, to estabilish contacts once again with human civilizations that could have endured in the cut-off sections of space.

It was so that many eyes were attracted to the dissipation of the monstrous warp-storm known only as the Howling. Situated into the Eastern Fringe, at the eastern limit of the Imperium, this phenomena had been covering the entirety of the northern half of the Sagittarius Arm for almost ten thousands years, so fierce in its intensity that even Hive Fleet Kraken had shed well away from it.

As it dissipated, the forces of the Imperium set themselves into motion to reclaim the expanses of space it had hidden. The year was the 943st of the 41st Millennium.

While the Administratum, ponderous and slow in its workings as only such a colossus of an organization could be, struggled to organize an expedition, the tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus pledged themselves to this journey in earnest. Fanatical devout to the task of re-discovering lost technology, the tech-priests hoped to find scientific marvels made lost by millennia of unceasing war, a possibility that the relative isolation provided by the Howling seemed to make auspiciously probable.

Using the close Forge World of Tarronak as a staging ground, an entire Explorator Fleet was sent into the Sagittarius Arm, complemented by great numbers of the cyborg Skitarii warriors and warmachines whose arcane workings were privy only to the Omnissiah's anointed. It was a mighty force, a testament to the bounty that the Mechanicus hoped to reap from the venture.

Still, as quick as they were, they weren't the only ones.

To the surprise of many, the Ecclesiarchy, the all-powerful Church of the God-Emperor, had moved as well. From golden pulpits shadowed by the solemn gaze of the Aquila, the ministers of the faith had called for the faithful to rise, to make so that it was not the half-heretical brethren of the Machine God to bring back these lost world into the bosom of the Imperium, but the true believers of the Imperial Creed. They had called for a crusade.

Prohibited by iron treaties from raising forces of male soldiers in regular times, still the Ecclesiarchy's reach was long. Strings were pulled into the highest echelons of power, generals, power-brokers and politicians alike swayed, bribed or threatened to assist this most holy of missions, until the flow of faith was ready to step forward.

On the sacred Cardinal-World of Liberia, under the blessing of Cardinal-Astral Azariah XXVI, regiments of the Astra Militarum were gathered, rows upon rows of soldiers and mighty tanks, their discipline, loyalty and fortitude secured by grim-faced Commissars and bellowing preachers. At their side stood masses of frothing zealots and flagellants, mutants searching for redemption for the wickedness of their spirits, believers made malformed by their violent faith; howling mobs not made of warriors, but of armed pilgrims, all of them sharing the fanatical lust for the blood of the enemies of the True Faith. To their disorder made a jarring contrast the lethal grace and discipline of the Sororitas, sisterhood of fanatical warriors-monks and armed fist of the Ecclesiarchy. Decked into ancient power armors, with their weapons of flaming destruction and the horrifying penitence-machines, they showed the fate of all those that dared to oppose the will of the God-Emperor's chosen. This mighty army, escorted by an entire battlegroupd, lacked the technological sophistication of the Mechanicus, but more than made up for it by sheer numbers and fanatical zeal.

The year was the 944st of the 41st Millennium.

The two fleets set off almost at the same moment, entering into the nothern reaches of the Sagittarius Arm by two different routes. Knowing their differences, and wishing to keep any waste born from it at a minimum, the commanders of the two expeditions took meticulous care of following different paths. Luckily for them, what they found was more than enough to keep their attention fully occupied.

Dubbed the Whispering Expanse by Navigators for the echoes left into the Warp by the Warp-Storm, the section of space left open by the disappearance of the Howling quickly proved itself to be well populated. Small Xeno potentates littered its worlds along with planets ravaged by small-scale Warp rifts from which capering daemons invaded realspace.

For years, both fleets unleashed their zealotry over these objectives, scouring worlds clean of daemonic and xeno taint alike. Many losses were taken during these engagements, but neither of the two forces was discouraged from its course, the Mechanicus pushed by their thirst for knowledge and the forces of the Ecclesiarchy simply rejoicing into the holy work of purging the enemies of mankind.

Eventually, though, the hope of fading human enclaves still alive was to be met with success.

Exactly fifteen years after the beginning of the twin expedition, the Mechanicus fleet made contact with the extreme pronges of a human civilization.

Centered around a cluster of three star systems, this human potentate was known to friends and foes as the Inherited Kingdom of Ymilgard. Cut off from the wider Imperium for almost ten thousands years, it had lived a stormy existence, passing through periods of eslavement to stronger civilizations and renaissances and freedom, passing through names and incarnations, waxing and waning through the millennia. Eventually, it had endured.

When the Mechanicus fleet made contact with it, the Kingdom was at the zenith of its power. Tightly bond to its Mhoim neighbors, it spanned across a grand total of sevtny-five worlds, with a number of minor Xenos civilizations as its vassals. It was a powerful and well-ordered domain, with superbly well-equipped and trained armies and a strong unity, centered around the Church of the Foundry of Light, a version of the Church of the God-Emperor, and an ancient visage of the Imperial Truth.

The first reaction of the two meeting parties was of mutual awe and enthusiasm. The Kingdom had held into its legends of the existence of the Imperium and numerous state-sanctioned seers had prophesied of an eventual reunion along the millennia. For their part, the tech-priests were astonished to see the Ymilgard use weapons and machines unseen into the wider Imperium by millennia and were eager to re-learn the craft needed to produce them.

The peaceful reunion was quickly cut short. To the horror of the Mechanicus adepts, the Ymilgard used practices declared as heretek. Their weapons and machines weren't all product of blessed STC lost to the Imperium, but a great deal of them was product of the most damnable practice of innovation. Infinitely worse, the Ymilgard didn't restrict the use of technology to a religious caste, but allowed civilians to get privy of their highest mysteries, they didn't show proper respect to the machine not with prayer nor with rites and treated the machine spirits just like inert things. Finally, the peak of heresy, they allowed for Psykers to flourish unchecked, joined into a great single Order.

The Kingdom was as much as unimpressed. The unthinking zealotry of the Mechanicus, their religious, ignorance-riddled approach to handling technology, their lack of regard for the human life, all of their ideology was abhorrent to its inhabitants and governants.

Tensions escalated quickly between the two parties, the only thing keeping the Mechanicus forces from attacking whom they saw as the blackest of hereteks the sheer military might of the Kingdom, that far outweighted their own.

Eventually, things came to an end when the most zealous of the tech-priests, ever-fractious in their labyrinthine hierarchy, had their forces open fire against Kingdom's citizen. Ymilgard's reaction, supported by years of preparations only for this unavoidable event, was swift and lethal.

Massive fleets attacked the Explorator Group, the arcane weapons of the Ymilgard destroying and crippling the overhelming majority of the Mechanicus vessels in one fell swoop. The Skitarii already deployed on the border planets of the Kingdom, their masters having been denied access to it, were left cut off and leaderless and quickly fell to the combined might of already prepared armies. Only a few of the Mechanicus ships managed to flee, making all speed for Imperial Space. It was the 965st of the 41st Millennium.

On their different path, the Ecclesiarchy fleet was destined to face a similar fate.

Battered by years of fighting but unbroken in spirit, the forces of the Church made slow way toward the Ymilgad space by another route. Their path led them to the powerful neighbor of the Kingdom, the Mhoim Protectorate. Spanning more than a thousand worlds, the Protectorate was a true colossus of might, the most powerful force of the Sagittarius Arm. Its inhabitants belonged to the abhuman race long believed lost to the Tyranids, known to the Imperium as Homo Rotundus or Squats. Still, the Mhoim defied the known classification, being different both in credence and physiche even while remaining as war-like and stubborn as their known counterpart.

The meeting between the Mhoim and the Ecclesiarchy was to be a traumatic one right from the start.

Already informed about the newly-arrived interlopers by their scouting forces, the abhumans scoffed at the Ecclesiarchy's demands to bow before true humans. Claiming their allegiance to belong only to their shrouded deity, the Mhoim Great Father, the Mhoim rejected any attempt to put their independence in danger and any ill-conceived claim to superiority by the "manlings".

The Ecclesiarchy, unburdened by the Mechanicus' restraint, stroke immediately against those that dared to make such heretical proclamations.

Their fleet was shredded, their forces annihilated.

Barely a handful of vessels, all boarding the Ecclesiarchy's fleet high echelons, managed to escape from Mhoim space and only the quick intervention and rapidly conceded asylum by the Ymilgard saved even these last remnants by swift extermination.

For the traumatized Ecclesiarchs, the respect gave to them by the Kingdom was a gladly accepted gift and they were more than happy to overlook any Mechanicus-perceived heresies. The Ymilgard government, heavily backed by the Church of the Foundry and its mysterious order of Daemon-slayers known as the Representatives, and by the powerful psyker Order of Pyrus did its utmost to give the Ecclesiarchs the image of a faith-laden domain. They were so succesful than when the Ecclesiarchy last surviving ships left the Kingdom's space, protected by Ymilgard escorts, the preachers and high-priests aboard brought back to their masters voice that a new realm of faith and purity hd been added to his Imperial Majesty's eternal domain. It was the 973st of the 41st Millennium.

Still, as much as good for peaceful negotiations this was, war seemed to be the only possible outcome.

The Mechanicus, envious and hateful of those it had come to perceive as the most despicable of Hereteks, assembled a mighty warhost, intent on snatching by blades and bolt sthe Omnissiah's secrets by those that dared to disdain its precepts. A wrench in their projects was to be put by the most unlikely of sources: the Ultramarines.

The noble Chapter had been approached by forces of the Ymilgard and the Mhoim and asked to act as a intermediaries. Both domains wished to be part of the Imperium, not as slaves and not at the price of their culture, but as allies and equals.

Ever mindful of reasonable approaches, the Ultramarines accepted the ambassadors' pleas. Wasn't obviously wiser to accept such mighty domains in the Imperium with only strokes of pen and exchanged words instead of terrible wars that would leave both more vulnerable to the mani-fold horrors of the galaxy?

They brought the matter to the Administratum, advocating for Ymilgard and Mhoim both, and found eager attention. The mammoth government of the Imperium, even its uncountable resources stretched thin under ever-growing threats of which the looming Thirteen Black Crusade was to be the greatest, was more than eager to find allies for its endless wars. The lack of direct participation in the Sagittarian Crusade, as the ill-fated twin expedition had come to be called, had left the highest echelons of the Imperium restless, ever-concerned as they were for the spreading of the already incredibly powerful Mechanicus and Ecclesiarchy. Now, they had the chance to assert their influence once again, and it was a chance that they took gladly.

With the whole-hearted support of the Ecclesiarchy, the Administratum gave to Ymilgard and Mhoim the status of allied, indipendent Kingdoms, similar to how the Realm of Ultramar itself was considered into the annals of imperial bureucracy. The frenzied protests of the tech-priests fell on deaf ears. It was too great of a prize to discard, and the Administratum banned any attempt from Imperial forces to bring harm to these newly-found allies.

Now, as the 41st Millennium steps to a close, the processes set into motion by the Sagittarian Crusade are coming to a head.

The Mechanicus, unmoved in its aims, schemes to reclaim technology that considers to be its due and to bring about the fall of its enemies, no matter the cost to the wider Imperium. The Ecclesiarchy, as much as good-inclined it is toward the Ymilgard, still harbours deep-seated grudges for the abhuman Mhoim and only with massive effort it will be diverted by projects of vengeance, let alone to impose its own brand of fanatical sealot on the more-measured Church of the Foundry of Light. Both Ymilgard and Mhoim won't accept threats to their independence and culture, and both parties' stubborness isn't good for a peaceful outcome. The Ultramarines try to act as peace-brokers, but their efforts hardly meet with success.

As the end of the Dark Millennium approaches, the Imperium faces its greatest challenges yet.

The Warp stirs to unprecedented levels of frenzy, its daemonic inhabitants breaching the Veil to feast upon mortal souls in growing numbers of occasions. Heresy ran rampant in countless worlds, the madness of the Warp only a breath away.

The ever-present threat of the Xenos is rearing up once again. The young Tau Empire launches its Fifth Sphere of Expansion, its ideology of the Greater Good almost as powerful as the cutting edge tech of its armies into swaying planets from the Emperor's light.

The Tyranids, the slaved monsters of the sinister Hive Mind, slither their way through the galaxy as an unstoppable avalanche of bio-engineered monstrosities. Uncountable planets have already fallen to the jaws of the Great Devourer, pulped into biomass and consumed to fuel the Hive Fleets' insatiable hunger. Leviathan, the greatest and most powerful Hive Fleet ever-encountered, ravages its way across the stars, its unfathomable aims seeming to bring it toward the Throneworld itself.

The Orks mass into numbers never seen from the Waaagh of the Beast itself, their warp-crazed shamans declaring that the time for the Great Waaagh, when even Gork and Mork themselves, their bestial Gods, will break their way into realspace, is finally coming.

And still, all of these threats are trumped by the might of the Thirteen Black Crusade, the final hammerblow that the traitor Warmaster Abaddon is about to unleash from the hellish Eye of Terror. Fuelled by the hatred of ten thousand years, gathering behind himself the full might of the Four Brothers of the Warp, the traitorous Warmaster prepares to make fall upon the Galaxy his greatest assault yet and this time he won't stop until the Terra itself is devoured and the False Emperor is thrown down from his Golde Throne.

And these are only a part of the terrible threats to the Imperium of Man. Shadowy dangers slither between the darkness of space, their gazes moving upon an already besieged realm.

Should war comes to the Sagittarius Arm, it could means the final nail to the already rapidly-closing coffin for the Dominion of Man. The forces required to bring such a conflict to bear would mean the weakening of already emblattled sectors, with dire consequences for all of the Imperium. Should a line of resistance fall, it's impossible to foresee the catastrophe that would befall humanity, but nothing short of total decimation would suffice.

As destiny rushes forward, moves are made and the eyes of many falls upon the Sagittarius Arm. If it will bring renewed hope or doom for all, only those that stand Beyond know for sure…


	2. A night of revelations part 1

The Church was trembling.

Closed in his cell, Father Gast kneeled before his small shrine. His hands, made hard and wrinkled by a lifetime of work, were clasped in prayer, grasped tightly to stop the skin of his face was stretched taut over bones, pale and slick with sweat. The tunic he wore fell over his skeletal form like a sackcloth. Woven over the heart, the symbol of the Foundry, the Flame in the Eye, seemed to catch the flickering light of the candles.

The old priest oscillated back and forth, his taut lips moving wordlessly, quickly, oh, so quickly, reciting litanies made familiar by long years of costant exercises.

He was poor, Father Gast, one of the priests of the Old Moon. His order asked for the oath of absolute poverty and he had taken it to heart. His cell was small and cramped; before he took it as his own almost thirty years before, it had been only a space for storage and even earlier a true cell for prisoners. The walls were naked stone, slick with humidity. The only things inside were the straw mat where he slept, a old copy of the The Words of the Foundry, a small bedpan, a pot full of water and the shrine. Many time the other monks had asked him to move in a more comfortable place, those requests getting more frequent as the pains of old age came upon him. He had always had none of it. How could he? That cell was his temple. What priest abandoned his temple?

The cell shook once again, making the votive bells of the shrine tingle. Father Gast lost his rythm for a heartbeat, then started back from the beginning, quicker than before.

As a father of the Old Moon, he had dedicated his life to those that life had forgotten. Elders without nobody to take care of them, young that had destroyed their bodies with drugs or other means. They came to him, to his little refuge at the outskirt of the city, and he took care of them, gave them a place where they could rest, wait for the end in a measure of peace. The air of that sad little place, he remembered always; it tasted of wilted flowers and wrong choices. And the smiles, he always remembered the smiles, when they closed their eyes. They always smiled.

He hadn't loved his work, no, but he had took solemn pride out of it. When health had let him down, it had been a terrible pain for him to leave it. He had taken to the silence and loneliness of the cell like an old dog nursing his wounds, masking pain and emptiness with pretences of holiness and ascetism.

In prayer and meditation he had found his purpose once again. He had watched inside of himself, searched, first grudgingly then with eagerness. There, in the soul of the soul, he had glimpsed, only glimpsed!, of the Light of the Foundry that burns at the center of the Galaxy, on Sacred Terra. The pain he had felt, the anguish! As The Words taught, there was a Man in the Fire, eternally dying but never quite so, held to his burning throne by chains of dripping silver. And He howled, words and meaning lost amidst the burning.

The vision had scarred him, burned him deeply, but given him purpose. For thirty years he had prayed to the Man in the Fire, studying the most sacred doctrines of the Church; and how a man can take a flicker of His torment upon himself, so that the Man can have his own assuaged, even if only by the tiniest bit. It was a sacred mission, and one that he had taken to gladly even as his body had decayed before his own eyes, even when his legs had become uncapable of holding him, even when, during the most silent night, he could feel the soft crackle of the weft of his life over the fire. It was the same that he did before, he felt. He was helping one who was lost to at least mitigate the pain of his last moments. He felt the same solemn pride of those far away days from it.

And now, it was his turn.

A violent boom in the distance. Screams, rushed steps and the sound of battle. A drop of sweat dripped from Father Gast's chin and over his clasped hands. For all his life, he had dealt with death and the ending of existences. He wasn't scared to pass through the door. But, to fall in their clutches? Oh Foundry, the thought alone was enough to freeze the blood in his veins.

The steps were getting closer now. The guards must have been overhelmed. They were coming.

Children of perdition, aspirants to dark salvation, pursuers of the forbitten and pawns of evil. The Lost. They now came for his soul.

He didn't fear death. He had no respect for pain. But he feared his own weakness and the inventiveness of the mind of the twisted. The terrible thought of himself, broken by the darkness, made to disavow everything he had stood in life; the infinitely small measure of relief he had brought to the Man in the Fire, reneged upon. The little measure of work done during his existence, undone by his own hands, his mind broken to the point of even losing the knowledge of himself. Foundry, the deathly chill that those thoughts put in his soul.

"Give me the strenght…" He murmured. "Give me the strenght to not fail. If not, give me death, so that my works won't be undone by myself..."

The steps came to the door. Rough voices barked just outside. The door rattled under violent blows.

Father Gast reached for the alcove of the shrine. With trembling hands, he turned the small statuette inside. It represented the Burning Eye, the symbol of his Church. This time, it was better for Him to not see. Slowly, every blow against the door making his skin crawl, he raised a small pouch and let a single drop of water fall each of the seven candles. One by one, their small flames went out with barely a fizzle, until only one remained, its unsteady light painting the cell with flickering shadows. One candle for the dead, so that they may find their way. Would it illuminate his own too? He left the pouch fall with a grimace. Even that small effort had been enough to sap his energies.

He took a small, wheezing breath. For as much good it could be, he was ready.

The door gave way with a crash of broken hinges, smashing against the wall.

Two figures rushed inside, only to stop in their tracks at seeing him.

Father Gast watched them with almost morbid fascination. How many times you could see the faces of your assassins?

They were normal people, only… not.

The leading one was a young man, handsome, tall and well-built, with the air of the warrior and the leader about him; his raven hair were cut to the sides of the head and continued into a complicated braid that he kept twirled on a shoulder. Hanging beside and just a little behind him, almost like a familiar of some sort, his comrade was stocky and heavy-set, with large hands and stout feet. He had large, bushy eyebrows and rough features. They both wore the fatigues of workers, but that was where the similarities with normal people ended.

They both had an angry, malicious light in their eyes, a wicked note that added cruelty to handsome looks and ferinity to rough features. Their fatigues were stained with blood, as well as both their hands, nails and the improvised weapons they wielded; the stocky one's teeth were red also.

Father Gast could feel the… taint, hanging over both. It was like a sickeningly sweet smell, it tasted of crushed roses and burned meat.

"The False Saint!" The stocky one squealed. "Let's rip him apart!" He was already coming forward, but his comrade blocked his way.

"Not so fast." He said, his voice as handsome as his looks. "The Master has plans for this one. We'll take him alive."

The stocky one looked like a baby having been denied his birthday prize. On a man of that size, it was grotesque. "B-but…!"

The handsome one shot him a poisonous look. "Do you challenge me?"

Father Gast felt a small jolt at seeing what he thought was only a braid twist move and slither, and make a tongue pass over only barely parted lips.

It was enough for the stocky one. "I-i would never!" He protested, eyes falling on the floor like a flogged dog.

The handsome one just nodded, then turned to him.

Father Gast didn't abstain himself from that gaze. He was surprised at how calm he felt. Now that he saw them, the terror that had held him in his clutch seemed to have vanished entirely. His mind was still.

"Didn't pray enough, did we?" The handsome one hissed, mouth twisting into a sneer. He advanced inside the cell. "Or maybe that God of yours can't do shite about this, ah? Or maybe he doesn't exist at all!"

"Yeah, at all!" The stocky one parrotted, barking a choking laughter.

Father Gast didn't answer. He found himself wondering, instead. What kind of path could have brought those two to that moment, before him, now? What tragedies, selfishness, ignorance, boredom had brought them to make the choices that had led them there? They spoke just like so many he heard, so many he had met.

The handsome one's features tightened into a scowl. "Well? Nothing to say, old man?"

"Ah! He's pissing himself! That's why he doesn't talk!" Jeered the other.

The handsome one didn't smirk. He advanced quickly, and grabbed him by the tunic.

"Well? Cat got your tongue? Speak!"

Father Gast didn't shy away from his grasp nor struggled. There was an urgency in the young man's words that he couldn't quite understand. Like he was asking for an explanation. Father Gast felt light flicker in his mind, words coming to his lips.

"The Foundry is a God in Waiting." He said. "He's still waiting for be born. Our faith makes that moment shy ever closer. When he arises, hope will be reborn with him."

Many times he had pronunced those words, as a student, as a teacher and then as a penitent alone in his cell. They formed the core of the principles of the Church of the Foundry, its deepest essence. He had lived them, caught their innermost meaning, found their truth. They had given him the strenght to always persevere, even when he could feel the pain of the Man in the Fire as his own; when he felt his flesh slough off and his eyes drip away, when bearing witness to His anguish made his heart melt with sadness and his shoulders fell under crushing despair. There was a meaning for that suffering, a light at the end of that dark road.

The blow came hard, catching him on the cheek, sending him sprawling on the straw bed.

"Bullshit!" The handsome one screamed. "There's no hope! There's only Chaos!" He grabbed him, forcing him to stand.

Father Gast lolled from his grasp, wheezing for air. Pain, burning like fire, flicked across his face. He felt blood on his jaw and a sensation like needles penetrating his skin. It was nothing, rain on stone, but the blow had dazed him. He still noticed that the knuckles of the young man were covered with bloody scabs. They shifted one upon the other like a swarm of cockroaches. He dazedly understood what those things he felt on his face were.

"Your God is a lie!" The young man shook him violently, his face twisted with hatred. "Do you hear me? A lie! He cannot save you, he cannot save anybody. Only the Great Mutator can!"

Another blow fell. Father Gast felt something break inside. Blood gushed from his nose. He could feel the things on his face getting aroused by it, the stocky one's breath becoming labored.

"He's nothing! You are nothing! There is only Chaos!" The handsome one howled, and his comrade joined him.

"Only Chaos!"

Father Gast didn't answer, didn't move. He brushed at the light inside and sent a small prayer, asked for the smallest of blessing. Warmth enfused his face, and he felt the little, swarming things whimper surprised. They withered, like ripened fruits under a blazing wind.

The handsome one's gaze faltered for a moment, but then his expression hardened. He raised his bloodied knife, brought it closer and closer until Father Gast could feel the cold over his skin, feel the blood slicking the edge.

"We're going to cut you up." He hissed. "Again and again, until you break. And then, we'll pour the truth inside of you, and you're gonna choke on it. You will sing your praises to Tzeentch with your screams."

In the feverish light of his eyes, Father Gast saw his destiny. Bloodied metal and broken glass. Oh, Foundry, let him have the strenght to endure. This scared him, scared him to the soul.

The young man had to catch a flicker of his fear, because his handsome features twisted into a cruel smirk.

"You look nice and ready. We're gonna begin right away."

The first cut was quick and bloody, cold wind and sneering jab. The stocky one squealed his appreciations. The second was slow and languid like a caress, whispering of forbidden things and the breaking of trusts.

Father Gast fell to the ground, howling laughters and horrible murmurings in his ears. His lifeblood slipped away, but the light was in him and gave him strenght. Oh, Foundry, pain was but an illusion, but he could feel them scratch at the door of his mind. They would take him, he knew, wash him away.

He scrabbled at cold stone with bloodied fingers, searching for something. If only could he make them see, at least leave a dent in the damnation that they had built around their souls. The Foundry was as real as the Ruinous and hope was its domain. If only he could make them see!

"Don't start to enjoy this too soon, old man." He heard the handsome one say. His voice was laden with excitation. "You will understand everything in due time."

Time, Father Gast pleaded. If only he had a little more time. He could feel destiny came to the door of the cell. It was close, so very close, rushing by with unstoppable force, bringing damnation with itself. If only he had a little more time… he could make them see! If only…!

"You will be the first sword with which i will cut to my soul." Said the handsome one, and his voice was already the voice of the damned. "My first tribute to the Great One."

"Sorry, not happening."

Destiny rushed inside the small cell as a dark form of dread. The stocky one squealed and fell, his blood painting the walls. The handsome one twirled, as quick as a snake. His knife flashed with bloody light. There was a clash of forms and weapons, then something bounced on the floor. It came to rest before Father Gast, the handsome features of the head still twisted with hatred inhuman.

Father Gast wheezed, spent. Destiny had come and passed. Not for him, but for those that would do him harm. And he… he couldn't have saved them. Failure weighted heavily over his heart.

"Father? Are you alright?"

He raised his head to look at his saviour.

The man was tall and made heavy-set by the black carapace armor that he wore. Gauntlets, boots, armor, rebreather and helm, there was not an inch of him that was visible. Even his eyes were only the large, unemotional circles of his rebreather mask. He wielded a hellgun, the barrel of the bulky weapon untouched, the bayonet attached at it wetted with red.

Father Gast swallowed, finding his throat dry. "Yes. I am fine."

Even with all the apparatus covering the soldier, he could still feel his amused dismay.

"Sorry to contraddict, father, but that doesn't look okay to me."

The burning remembered him of his wounds. Father Gast just sighed tiredly.

"Pain is only an illusion of the mind." He said.

"Right, but even so…" The soldier turned his head toward the door. Father Gast noticed that there were other people there. Other warriors, wearing the same black livery of the first.

To the soldier's gesture, one of them rushed inside, and kneeled at Father Gast's side.

"This will help you for the moment, Father." He said, his voice younger than his comrade's, and full of solemn respect. It only made the grasp that Father Gast felt at his heart turn tighter.

He sprayed something fresh on his face, and the pain dulled immediately to a distant throb. Father Gast thanked him, but he had eyes only for the head on the floor.

The medic seemed to notice.

"No need to be scared anymore, father." He encouraged. "They can't hurt you anymore."

Father Gast ruefully shook his head. "Not for me, my son. Not for me. I couldn't save them. I couldn't make them see the Foundry, and now they are lost." Failure was a beating pain in his heart.

Those words seemed to strike something in the medic, his gestures slowing for a moment before resuming their quick, efficent pace. .

His comrade, or his superior more probably, didn't seem as much impressed.

"They made their choice."

Father Gast couldn't refute the finality of his words, nor his truth. Still, a failure was a failure, but that was a weight for him alone to bear. So sad that before what he already bore it was as small as kindling.

He averted his gaze from the head.

"Is he here?" He asked.

The officer nodded, a gesture made somber by his facemask. "He is. Soon all of this madness will end."

Father Gast felt a tremor about what he was about to ask, but still he asked.

"I wish to see this for myself."

A wave of surprise passed through the soldiers. He felt the young medic beside him jolt.

"Father." The officer began. "It would be better for you to stay here until everything is fine…"

"Please. I need to see for myself the responsible of all of this."

The officer remained silent for a moment. A part of Father Gast wished for him to say no, that it was too dangerous, but the rest, the better part, knew that he had to be there, to see the end of the tragedy that had brough two lost souls to his door that day and reaped so many lives during its lenght. His soul itself demanded it, a call that, he was sure, contained the will of the Foundry. And he wouldn't ever try to escape from it, even knowing very well that he was not to receive anything but further unhappiness by bearing witness to it.

That same part of his rejoiced as the officer nodded slowly, even while a spike of sadness went through his heart.

Truly, fate could be cruel.

The planet Novius had always been an oasis of peace.

It was the third of a string of planets that made up one of five stellar sistems that made up on their turn the western quadrant of the peryphery of Ymilgard. Its position, barely a few parsecs before the emptiness of space between the Arms of the galaxy, had allowed it to avoid the greater part of the crisis that had hit the Kingdom down the millennia. The planet had nothing to offer, nothing that could be worth fighting a war over. His seas, comprising the majority of the surface, were made salty by vents in the still magmatic active underground and unfit for life, except for some very basic cellular forms. The very reduced lands were arid wastelands, where volcanoes, costant tremors, and strange, crystalline beasts made human life a dancing prospect.

These reasons had kept Novius relatively free from civilizations down the millennia, except for the small industry of salts and chemicals that the few investors interested in the planet could scrounge up, and the occasional hunters, searching for some of the beasts on the payroll of collectionists or for riches.

All had changed with the arrival of the 36st millennia. During that time, the Kingdom was passing through one of his worst crisis, a war against a tyrannical regime that had splintered the domain into pieces. Tired of the bloodshed, a splinter group of monks of the Foundry landed on Novius. They were men and women of simple customs, only searching for peace for their celebrations, and found that the out of hand, undesiderable planet suited their aims well.

There was only one place in the entire planet where human life was relatively possible; a great plateau on the north pole, high enough for noxious concentration of gases and beasts to not being able to reach it, and far away enough from the continental fissures to not suffer by continuous earthquakes. It was there that the small industries on the planet had built their establishments and from there carried out their meagre work.

The monks adopted it as their new home quickly, changing its name, with a bit of lack of regard for the local sensibilities, into the Steps of Heaven, as befit the magnificency of such a place. On a great buttress of rock that rose upon the plateau itself, they built their little abbey and nobody ever thought of disturbing them. There was plenty of space, and what harm a few preachers could ever do?

So, the monks busied themselves with their trade, estabilishing their own church and observing their prayers and celebrations. And that was to be for many years.

It had started as a small venture, but, curiously enough, went on to touch great events.

The monks, that didn't take an oath of celibacy, went to mingle with the small population and between themselves. As for the custom for humans, they multiplied until, centuries later, the abbey had become a great religious community. Then, greatness touched them. Exactly ten generations from the arrival of the first settlers, while the star of the Foundry vaxed strong, one was born between the walls of the abbey whose fate was great. Unlike his friends, teachers and family, he didn't search for illumination inside, but watched only to the world around. Taking a ship and with only a few comrades with him, he left Novius and made way for the wider galaxy. The Kingdom was a distant memory during those troubled times, the domain fractioned and broken under costant warfare. Fate saw the escaped man become a comforter of those in pain, a great leader and eventually a King and a Saint.

When old age had brought its veil upon him, he took the same ship he had used to escape and returned to his home. There he died and his remains were interred with all the honours under the central church of the abbey.

Many came to see the tomb of the one who saved the Kingdom, and the abbey and the community around grew to accomodate those that passed and those that decided to remain. The industry grew as well, fuelled by the influx of people, money and the interest of new investors. A positive trend of growth was estabilished that was destined to go on for centuries and that would see the humble abbey become a great monastery and a prestigious center of learning and study, and the community a sprawling, thriving city.

The continued blessing of the Foundry would see a long string of important religious figures rise from the ranks of the monastery, theologians, preachers and sheperds of the masses alike. Each of them would join the prestige of hailing from such a holy place to the actions, thought and decisions worthy of their heritage, both in the secular and in the religious. The monastery of Novius became even more renowed by their hands, a cradle for the holy and the wise, the words that came from it held in great esteem through all of the Kingdom.

In the millennia passed from its foundation, this tradition kept on going uninterrupted. Two Saints hailed from Novius, the first a warrior and an exorcist, a scourge upon daemonkind, the second a preacher, a student, and a martyr. Both were brought back to their homeworld after death and interred close to their predecessors.

Many said that they had come from the same bloodline of the first Saint and that have been same blood, circling into the ranks of the monastery in some form or other, carrying the blessing of the Forge, to have brought forth so many gifted figures. The heads of the monastery had always rejected such notion, merit by bloodline was considered false by their doctrine, and for this reason they had made sure that no record of the actual descendants of the first Saint had ever been kept, and the same they did about those that came from the second and the third. Not in inherited blood they believed true worth to be, but in effort, study and faith, nor, less innocently, they wanted for their authority to be challenged by those proclaming to belong to that same bloodline. Through careful controls, they erased any evidence of direct descendants, keeping the inheritance of grace a possession of the entire monastery.

Still, the results were the same. The monastery of Novius, and the city sprung around it, flourished, fuelled by the costant streams of pilgrims and the multi-faceted trade born around it. Industry was strong, relationships with the sorrounding systems plenty and fruitful.

Now, as the 41st millennium came to an end, the city enjoyed its prosperity as it had always did. Its masters' words carried great weight, influencing decisions wrought even in the far-away Royal Court; the mineral and chemical goods obtained in the wastes all around were carried over numerous star systems, paid by eager buyers or exchanged for all the products that the planet couldn't produce by itself.

As of today, Novius was a productive, peaceful community, its inhabitants' time punctuated by the din of productive labor, the echoes of hymns, the soft hum of prayer and the passing of celebrations.

It was time for things to change.

This thought Drakalis Austerion, master of lies, betrayer of his family and his people, bringer of Change and servant of Great Tzeentch, as he leisurely strolled under the moon.

The great, solemn stairs that connected, through an ardous path of twists and turns cut through the rock, the city to the monastery resounded to his lonely steps. But he wasn't alone. It had been many years since the last time he had been such.

Drakalis stopped, his long cape of crow feathers fluttering around his sturdy frame despite being no breeze. Each feather shifted subtly at every movement, passing through a range of forms and ghost-like colours without apparent order.

He watched down, at the sea of lights of the sleeping city. It wasn't a welcome sight. It was… stale, unmoving, rotten. Thankfully, the unpleasantness brought by that rancid landscape was mitigated by the knowledge and feeling of triumph.

He inspired, letting the cool night air fill his lungs. It was always cold at that altitude, the same height that had allowed for human life to flourish there robbing it of more milder climates. But not that night. That night was special. His night.

He resumed his walking, making his long staff tap over stone weathered by the passage of millennia of pilgrims. The stars, allineated into the right positions, winked at him, not as some boring dots of light windowing over the past, but each as a smiling eye, all together a configuration of arcane significance. And the moon, ah, the moon. He could see the reflection of liquid faces upon it, their voices piping softly of unmerciful change. A smile crept up over his face. What auspicious signs. Beautiful too.

In his wake, opalescent smoke rose from the stone. There were shapes in the smoke: mouths and eyes and claws, all of them writhing and dancing and moving, until there was an army of spectral figures coming behind the warlock, dancing like during a great festivity. The immute air brought, from time to time, soft piping, muffled, like there was, very far away, a large band, making the last adjustments to their instruments before a great prime.

Drakalis could feel the eagerness in the air with more than the mundane senses, a buzzing in the brain. He didn't bide them to be patient. They had waited long enough. He had waited long enough. But no more. Waiting belonged to another life.

In that life, Drakalis Asterios had been called Astur and had been a member of the community living inside of the monastery. The only son of a minor priest, he had never known his mother but in the furious ramblings of his father against unfaithfulness and craftiness; and they were immancably followed by grave admonisments to never act without good principles, as the blood flowing in his veins demanded greater callings.

Even without fully understanding at the time, he had still took those words at heart. The sons and daughters of the priests were raised by the masters of the monastery to become a new generation of religious servants, and Astur had put his all both in studies and eagerness to please. He had managed to climb high, but never as much as his capabilities deserved. His stupid father, with his drunkeness, his costant need to be cared for, his scandals, kept him from reaching the place that he rightfully deserved.

Another turn of the path brought him on sight of his destination. The central monastery of Novius, the most ancient, most revered part and nucleus of the complex stood upon the peak of the ridge, watching down the city below like a brooding old eagle upon its own nest. Except for the earliest enlargements and constructions, it had stood unchanged through the millennia. Drakalis could feel the aura of sacredness of the place press upon his esoteric senses. It was similar to a chorus of silvery whispers, like great moltitudes were in prayer at that same moment. It felt like frigidly cold water pushed against his flesh.

A massive gate blocked the path going ahead, with two great towers flanking it on both sides, slits on their dour surfaces allowing for gun emplacements. The sacredness flowed through the fortification, making the minute scriptures etched upon stone and gate glow with gentle light. The smoke stopped at some paces from them, billowing and curling like it had hit an invisible barrier, the shapes in it losing coherence.

One of the gun emplacements went in activity, the heavy bolter starting to spit death.

Drakalis barely aknowledged the rain of projectiles falling all around him, those that were supposed to hit him being devoured by blue flame before they could find their mark, like flies caught in the fire. As part of his scheme, he had allowed for one guard to remain to his post with all his wits intact. A sacrifice to wet the tongue of those Beyond was always a bringer of good omens, and the small detail in the great design was pleasing.

Drakalis pointed his open palm against the spitting gun and recited a whispered incantation of power. A prayer, very ironically, and a command at the same time, held upon the minor spirits so that they moved to make so that the schemes of the Master were brought to fruition. The fog-shapes formed into great grins. Drakalis felt their eager approvation. A flicker of flame licked his fingers, shooting forward to engulf the top half of the tower. The heavy bolter fell immediately silent. The flame went and disappeared as quickly as it had come, leaving only the warped profile of the tower.

Drakalis considered the new, five-pointed shape as well as the new coloration and texture of the rock, now infused with groaning life, to be auspicious, if not more aestetically pleasing. He didn't flinch when the aura of the place killed it, making the newly sprout living crystal wither and die. He turned instead to regard the gate.

Truthfully, it hadn't been only his father's antics to keep his ascent at bay. An unseen, powerful hand was to blame too, a hidden force whose existence he had come to realize only with half-formed intuitions and vague suppositions. For many years, he was destined to not understand the nature of this enemy, but, as his father's last hour came, that knowledge finally found him. With his last words, the pathetic wretch revealed to him that the blood flowing in his veins was the same of the first Saint that had come from Novius, the great leader that had ascended to become a saviour and a king; and that same blood, blessed by the Foundry, had been made even more noble by giving birth to the Daemonslayer and the Martyr, both of which were laid to rest in the same place of their progenitor. It was an unbroken, noble bloodline their own, heavy with blessing and destined for greatness. His father, whose declarations he would have discarded like the ramblings of the fool that he was, were made undeniable by certain objects and certain knowledges that only a true descendant of the trio could ever possess.

Everything was made clear by that revelation. The unseen force that he couldn't pinpoint but of which he had perceived the hand, was the same masters that ruled upon the monastery. They themselves had declared how the bloodline had to be kept unknown, so that no one could claim greatness only by the blood that ran into his veins. It was clear that they knew much more that they actually let on and they had made sure that the legitimate heir was kept down in the dust, so that he couldn't rise to challenge their authority.

The ipocrisy of it all was such that, the blood of his father still warm, Astur, poor, foolish Astur, had ran before the masters. With proofs at hand, he had launched his accusations and demanded his due, just like a raving madman. The thought that in another life he had been that fool made Drakalis guts churn with disgust.

He advanced toward the gate. There were rows and rows and word minutely inscribed upon it, promising refuge to all faithful that came in peace and baring the passage to all those that came with ill will. They glowed as he came near, and he could feel the cold of their power struggle against his advance. Drakalis smirked at it. The weak power of a weak God. It was time for it to witness true power.

He raised his staff. Three long tongues topped it, forming a spiral with their sinuous movements. Between them, a flickering blue flame hung in the air.

Drakalis watched it with fascination. To be truth, he had a fascination for fire since he was a child. Some evenings, tired after an afternoon passed playing over the steps or in the gardens, he would remain by the fireplace, admiring how the wood would crackle and smoulder under the caresses of the flame. What it fascinated him was to think that an element could have the power to change crude matter into something more. To his juvenile fantasy, the burning wood was trasformed, shedding its mortail coils and returning to the earth as ash or raising to the sky as smoke, passing into new existences that were both greater and lesser, with new oceans of possibilities. The change mesmerized him.

At the time, he had no idea what True Flame was.

With a gentle whisper, he blew on the blue spark, sending a little line of flame against the gate. The glowing scriptures warped like under a cover of hot air, smoke raising from them as they struggled to repel the power projected upon them. A small chink into one of them, a tiny thing really, glowed with blue light. The flame rushed to it like it was being sucked inside. It rushed under the surface of the gate, extending like a pool of water. Drakalis' smirk grew wider as the first cracks started to appear.

After his imbecilic outburst, he had had much time to think. The masters had him confined, so that he could "meditate upon his words", pleasant words to hide what it was essentially the imprisonment of a threat. Of the proofs he had brought, he never saw anything again, of course.

In the long days passed alone, with only his hatred as his company, he busied himself by berating everyone and everything that had made his life lesser than he wanted it to be. His father, the hypocritical masters, his family, his friends, everyone he had ever known. And still, when anger, spent, finally subsided, doubts rose in its place. Maybe he was wrong? Maybe his blood wasn't as great as he thought. After all, it hadn't passed through wretches like his father? Maybe that was the problem. It had been muddled by generations of imbeciles, made thinner by their idiotic actions before having a chance to express itself once again through the latest heir.

Prey to those doubts, despair threatening to overtaking him, he invoked the name of the Foundry. He asked for the blessing made due to him by the actions of his greatest progenitors, for he wouldn't squander it like his predecessors had done.

Drakalis' smirk turned to a scowl as he remembered the humiliating silence to his requests, the anguished fury at being rejected, at having to suffer for his predecessors' faults. Under his anger, the blue fire quickened its pace. Other blue points, chipped into the words of protection, flared to life, each a nexus from which the flame spread all the faster.

Drakalis focused his emotions into a spearpoint, willing the process to quicken even more even as his recollection continued. In his fury, he had called to other Gods, darker ones, of which he had obtained knowledge by secretly studying forbidden texts. He had done so during his studies, when he still hoped to impress the masters with his knowledge. He wasn't thinking logically at the time, his call more the retort of an angry child than a choice made with full conscience.

And still, something had replied. The Shambler had came to him, into his lonely cell.

Drakalis felt shivers of ecstatic terror at remembering his multi-faceted master. Initially he had been afraid, terrified out of his wits, but in time he had come to recognize the truth of the words of that revered being. Ah, the beauty of his speech. Or her. Trivialities like gender didn't matter to such grandiose beings. And the truths it had brought him! The multi-faceted screaming cackling frothing foaming croaking word that stood at the center of it all! Flesh is wax. Stone is smoke. Truth is Lie and Lie is Truth. The bulging, pulsing, squirming movements underlying what restricted minds called reality but it was but a skin over the whole, the peel of the apple, the skin of the snake, destined to change and reform and change again, never never never stopping. And in change itself, sacredness, holiness, life unbound and true in its endless nuances, endless masks.

The revelation made by a the dying father had brought to a greater revelation, received in a lonely cell. Blood was powerful, yes, but destiny rushed over it all and behind destiny a mind, vast enough to cover the night sky, omniscient, all-seeing, perfect. It had guided him at every step, peeled reality before his blind eyes until he could see the naked pulp underneath, and sink his teeth in it.

The King had started the flow of greatness, and the Hunter and the Martyr had perpetuated it, but they hadn't but stepping stones to the work of the Heir, their greatness built so that the great revelation be brought upon the last scion of the line. His work would eclipse them all, rising above the lies of the Foundry and joining the greatness of his bloodline to the greatness of bringing forth the Truth, the real Truth, to all the world, to all worlds.

The flame had reached to encompass all of the hidden chinks now, the joined points forming a constellation of startling beauty. The emblem of the Great Mutator fizzled into the gate, the paltry wards crumpling under its warping touch. Drakalis bathed into its power, feeling it reshape reality in a way that only his arcane senses could truly appreciate. Then, he completed the incantation. The gate disappeared into a shimmering haze of colours.

It was the last dam breaking. The aura of sacredness warped, the chorus of whispers twisting with discordant noises. The piping rose to a gleeful crescendo. The holiness of the house had been breached. No more staleness, no more! Pinpricks of multicolored light appeared all around Drakalis, growing into bulging distortions of space. The veil resisted for a moment still, then the warlock hammered his staff into the stone and, with a sound of lacerated cloth and broken glass, reality collapsed. The distortions snapped wide open, disgorging the spawns of the Great Mutator. They came with explosion of fluids and the snapping of ripped flesh. Grotesque bloated things the colour of pink meat, they danced and piroutted, jibbering and laughing, meowing and barking, the fog-shapes now made real in the realm of flesh.

Drakalis basked in their chaotic joy for a moment. That was the world where Drakalis Asterious belonged, the world of magic unchained and chaotic change. Astur had died inside of that tiny little cell, brought to it by the climax his own foolishness. What it had stepped out of it, the contrite, humble acolyte ready to repent for his misdeeds, to atone for it with his work, was already marked for greatness by destiny.

He stepped through the ruined gate, the daemons flocking behind him. Triumph was sweet upon his tongue, the sensation of long-concocted schemes come to final fruition.

After his discharge from prison, he had played the part of the repented well. Always the first to rise, always the last to rest, his mouth always curved into the smile of the eager servant, his hands always molded into the shapes of work. The foolish Astur would have balked at sustaining such a facade, but Drakalis Asterios had enjoyed the expertly woven lie, in itself a tribute to the Great Mutator. For decades he had schemed, building his power with secret studies, deepening his knowledge of the secret arts. His blood, running thick with power, had done his last service as a tribute and in giving it all he had grown high in the favour of the Court of Change, supping deep over the All-Seeing One's power. His new gifts had seen many flock to his banner in secret, foolish and dupes all. All of them he had attracted into his web, weaving lies, truth and magicks together, making some believe to fight for a just cause, offering to others hints of power, to others again lying only for the sake of the act. He had forged a maze of half-truths and schemes that had seen the Great Mutator mightily pleased, increasing his gifts even further.

Beyond the gate, another stair went up to the courtroom of the monastery, each step engraved with words of blessing and protection. The Daemons went to it, tittering and cackling, multicolored flame erupting where their bouncing bodies touched the stone. Weakened by discreet chippings, the wards managed only to put up a paltry resistance before dissolving into opalescent smoke.

From up ahead, from the monastery proper, Drakalis could hear sounds of battle. The satisfaction for another scheme well-ordained flushed through him. It hadn't been difficult to have his followers to make small chips into the wards that protected the monastery, each of them subtle enough to not alert the daily maintenance made upon them by the monks. Only an expert practioner of the secret arts like him could recognize the scheme they formed together, a sigil of weakening of bonds and of celebration of change. And still that had been just a simple move. The true masterpiece had been to have all the groups forming his following, each unknown to the rest, to rise as one during that night of blessings. Each of them had moved in a different way, bringing disturbances ranging from a bump in the night distracting guards to revolt brought forth with fire and violence. Fools, all of them, nothing but pawns of a larger scheme expertly woven so that their attempts not only didn't hinder each other, but complemented themselves perfectly to give him the perfect window of opportunity to act.

Stepping out of the stair and in the courtyard, he met the first people of the night. They were three, running, their trappings marking them as menials working into the monastery. They stopped at seeing him and his escort, crying out in surprise and terror, bringing up improvised weapons.

Drakalis watched them with mild amusement. The group of poor menials, thinking the turbolence of that night to be only a manifestation against too harsh masters, quickly fallen to confusion and terror as violence erupted. He wondered how their tiny brains held his appearance. That night was sacred, the Ni'l Ha'zak, the Unveiling of the Web, the supreme moment when all the schemes converged together to bring up the fail of reality and the passing of Change. That night, he had thrown away the glamours obscuring his true form, revealing the full splendour of the Change that the Great Mutator had bestowed over him.

His skin was as blue and opalescent as the crystals that formed Great Tzeentch's blessed realm, his head deformed into two curved horns, one longed and one shorter, forming the sacred symbol of the Broken Circle. His feathered cape fluttered around his cerimonial garbs, extending behind him like crow's wings held at repose but shuddering for the excitation of the fly. Where his boots touched the ground, opalescent smoke rose to envelope him into a smoky haze. Reality seemed to bend and twist around him, filigree-thin cracks spreading upon the stone from where he stood. His eyes, three, with one opened upon the forehead, burned with the endless fires of Change.

Drakalis allowed himself a moment of vanity, admiring his form through the eyes of the three simpletons. Their terror and connection to him made enter into their minds as simple as pushing apart reeds to look upon a lake of mud. The moment passed, he focused a fraction of his will upon them. Red threads of destiny connected them to each other and to him, forged by his lies and magicks and by their oath of loyalty. Drakalis made his power flow through them, then called for an unmerciful change, a single word that echoed into the air with arcane power.

The three menials were violently attracted together. Flesh boiled and melted. Limbs and torsos were fused together. New limbs and organs sprouted. The three became one.

The newly formed Spawn flailed with all its appendages, screaming and howling with too many mouths.

Drakalis nodded, finding it pleasing. None of the fools that had followed him would pass through the night untouched. If not killed by the retaliatory strike of the forces still loyal to the monastery, they would make sacrifices to the will of the Great Mutator. A most blessed end to tools that had spent their use. Destiny willing, maybe one of two would retain enough of their wits to be good material for disciples.

The hard bark of bolters attracted Drakalis' attention. Turning, he saw armored figures run in his direction. There were sixteen of them, all wearing the robust bulwark of power armors. The majority were human-sized, their armors red and gold, with embellishments of devotion and purity seals on their ceramite. The rest, five in total, were true giants, towering over their smaller brethren by the chest up. Their armors were black as night, but the religious emblems adorning them were the same.

Even in the gloom of the night they were a majestic sight, launching their warcries, their bolters' muzzle flaring. To Drakaris, they were only another part of the plan, helpefully come to play its role.

As a couple of daemons exploded in pink gore close by, the warlock mind-sent an order to the Spawn. The abomination gibbered, howled and barked all at one, then threw himself against the attackers.

A part of the armored soldiers turned their attention upon it, blasting at its warped bulk with bolters. The Spawn didn't even slow down while chunks of its flesh were blasted off. It swiped with an elongated limb, one of the smaller warrior dodging with a graceful movement.

The rest of the group kept charging at him. Drakalis appreciated their knowledge, if not their intelligence. They knew that he was the center of everything.

The Warlock took the measure of his assailants. Three giants and six smaller soldiers. But that wasn't correct, was it? They had their names. The Black Templars, of the vaunted Space Marines of the Anathema, and the Sisters of Battle of the Valorous Heart, the warrioresses of the Church of the Corpse God. He could feel their disgusting faith hang over them like a bad smell. Cold iron and cracklings embers. So boringly limited.

Drakalis directed the Daemons to attack them, a supplication that the joyous spirits were eager to carry out. Multicolored fire were spat against the charging warriors, clashing against their armors. They shrugged it off, their faith shielding them by the touch of Change, but they were slowed down nonetheless and the Daemons fell upon them in droves.

Amused, Drakalis watched them fight. The giants smashed everything around them, chopping with knives that would have been swords in the hands of normal humans or using their bulky bolters as crushing maces. The Sisters moved swiftly and gracefully, shooting, kicking and using the long bayonets on their weapons to deadly effects.

They fought with fury, skill and determination, but the Spawns of the Mutators were relentless in their joyful assault, and there were dozens of them. A Sister fell when a daemon that she had chopped down exploded into two, blue abominations that dragged her down. A giant was overhelmed by a wave of tittering abominations, his struggles still going on even when the swarm covered him completely. Another Battle Sister was engulfed by the breath of a Flamer, her armor and flesh twisting into monstrous shapes.

Drakalis found amusement and their struggles, each of their death resounding before his mind eye as the twinkling shut of a small star, and a boost to his own power. Both orders had sent their emissaries as a continuation of the rejoining between the Church of the Foundry and the wider Imperium. How amusingly fitting that they would become fodder for his continued ascension. Well, at least they would avoid all the chaos of the future. But enough of this. He was on a timetable.

Exhorting his will, he beckoned the stones forming the courtyard to shake their limited form, to rise into exultation and to strike down the enemies of the Form Unbound!

The floor of the courtyard exploded, throwing aside warriors and Daemons alike. Fragments of stone punched through armors, torso and limbs alike, ceramite being no protection against the pwoer of Change flowing through them. The Daemons kept tittering even while they were shredded to pieces, their material forms disappering into smokes. The warriors that weren't mangled right away were bodily thrown away, smashing against the floor of the courtyard or through the walls of the buildings all around. None of them got up again. Except for one.

This one had to be of singular will and faith, or maybe just had more powerful warding, as the blast of Change only made him stagger briefly. Wielding a large sword, he charged forward into the swarm of Daemons, chopping down left and right to open himself a path.

Drakalis seered. This champion of false gods spared barely a glance for the spawns that cut down, his eyes pointed only at the warlock.

He pointed his staff against him. The three tongues avidly licked the air as the blue flame that they contained flared to life. Drakalis felt the power to destroy and remake boil into his soul with waves of agony, ecstasy and feelings that the human tongue couldn't express. With his will, he focused it, concentrated it and then unleashed it!

A bolt of warp-power, unrestrained Change channelled into a single bolt of crackling energy. Shot from the staff. It flew through the air, the weave of reality crumpling in its waveand crashed against the warrior. Not even his superhuman strenght allowing him to resist, he was thrown off his feet, flying away and smashing into the floor with such force that he dug a trench in it before finally coming to a stop.

Exhaling multi-colour fumes, Drakalis drew back. Warped lightning crackled along his frame for a moment still, altering his thoughts into arcane patterns before he subdued it once again. Awed, he admired the power that his Master had bestowed upon him. Not even the superhuman Astartes, of which praises and fears the Warp sang highly, could stand against him. Especially not that night. That night, when the schemes were unveiled and destiny came to pass, the power of the puppetmaster was at its pinnacle.

Ecstatic, he noticed with vague surprise that the Astartes was actually still alive. His armor bent and warped, the warrior was struggling to free himself and get back on his feet.

Drakalis felt a surge of pitious contempt. How foolish! Truly, his Master spoke well when he had said that the enemies of the All-Seeing One would continue in their ways even beyond reason. In doing so, they served the Chaotic Way all the same, but still. It was admirably pitiful.

Raising his staff, he invoked for the stones to change and reclaim their freedom once again, to strike against a servant of their imprisonment this time. The ground already locking the warrior in place twisted and warped, fusing with his armor and breachin the servo-muscles moving it. Almost immediately, the Black Templar fell immobile, the failing of his armor's systems making it become his own little coffin.

Drakalis gazed into the darkened lenses of the helm. What his simple sight didn't allow him to see, he could perceive. And he could feel the warriors rapid breaths as the realization of his destiny dawned upon him.

Drakalis felt another surge of contempteous pity. Poor poor servants of a dead God. Fighting against such brutish, material things like the Orks could see their ignorant ways meet with success. But against the esoteric, the power of the Immaterium, what could good armors and good weapons bring? Even their faith, so ignorantly wielded, meant little, so little. Of course, there were those of them trained to fight the ones that called upon the Immaterium, and the Warp sang aloud of their successes and mailing, but they were so few, so very few.

Drakalis turned his back to the fallen warrior. He would leave him to the Daemons' tender caresses and, sensing his intentions, the spawns around him danced with joy.

He smiled. More and more of the Children of the Great Mutator were appearing in the courtyward, called to the material realm by his presence and by the breaking of the wards. Already there were enough to forget those felled by the resisting warriors. Drakalis bade them to spread across all of the monastery, to dance and mutate and be happy, to celebrate in his name and in the name of the Great Mutator. The Daemons cheered in his mind, a cacophony of hoots and sounds that changed while they rang, and cajoled in all directions, eager to start the festivities.

Drakalis bade a numerous group to remain to follow him. With the falling of the Gate, the most of the work was done, but there was still a celebration to be done before his triumph was complete.

With his escort of Daemons behind him, the Warlock started his path toward the main church of the monastery.

The streets that radiated from the courtyard to the church itself were narrow, a heritage from the old times when the monastery had been built to accomodate only a limited number of people. The flow of pilgrims allowed inside were to strictly regulated for this reason, a reason that had made introducting enough followers inside something of a difficulty, but even more rewarding in the eyes of the Great Mutator.

But, as he strolled across ancient cobbled paving, a thousand voices urging him forward, Drakalis didn't think about it. He basked only in the glory of the moment, lending ear from time to time at the sound of fighting still raging in the distance - and how they increased as the daemons made their presence known - and how his escorts cavorted joyously before him, stalking in the gloom, uncaring for gravity as they scuttled quickly across walls like they were floors or bent the boring predictability of reality to their whims.

As they went, the pall of sacredness reasserted itself. The Daemons' movements became sluggish, their multi-faceted sounds loosing their vitality, their attempts to bend shapes and light meeting more and more resistance. Even the voices that Drakalis heard in his mind seemed to step farther away.

The Warlock bore it with sneering determination. Very soon he wouldn't have anymore. Once the three tombs of the Saints were under his mutating grasp, the holiness of the place to the Foundry would be subverted and become fealty to the Great Mutator. The peak of a faith would make fuel for the peak of another and a warp rift would yawn open to the glory of the Beyond.

Drakalis entertained the glorious image for a moment, but the costricting holiness of the place castigated it for him, sending a spike of pain trough his brain. He reasserted his thought with a growl, familiar hatred coming to the fore. That place had been the temple to his limitation. That was the last time he would suffer its tiranny.

His thoughts moved quickly, bubbling like boiling fat, and hatred left place to quiet reminiscence, in a way that a mind still sane wouldn't follow. For the rest of the way, Drakaris entertained himself reminiscing the times when as a kid he had played along that same paths. Who knew if destiny would bring him to meet some of his old fellows? He still conserved a sliver of affection for them and for that they would make mighty sacrifices to the All-Seeing One. Under the pall of sacredness, he couldn't see the skein of fate, but hope was domain of his lord too…

Evetually, the Warlock and his entourage reached their destination.

The central plaza of the monastery was a grand space, built so that to the pilgrim emerging emerging from narrow street the sudden passage would evoke feelings of awe and majesty. The stylized visages of three Saints were etched into mosaics into the floor of the plaza, each represented in the act of standing defiant, praying in tears and standing grand upon a throne. Twelve columns ringed the center of the plaza, arranged in the twelve-pointed star of the Foundry. On each of them, minutelly sculpted into bands, the stories of the three Saints showed themselves to any visitor.

The church itself loomed up ahead, a stout building, lacking the graceful spires of more modern religious costructions, with squat towers and rough features that seemed to defy the challenge of time, like an old man whose vigour was still untouched.

Once, Drakalis felt only awe at seeing it, mixed with the knowledge that he was part of it and was destined to leave its mark upon it. Now… the place chafed. It seemed to taunt him with a past made of broken promises and hypocritical lies. The aura of sacredness was strong still here, even stronger than elsewhere. The chorus of whispers joined together into a single, silvery note of such disgusting… solidity, that it grated painfully upon his mystical senses. The act of prayers and faith was deeply embedded into every stone. He couldn't see the future or the past, but ghosts of pilgrims, their faces blank, paraded before his mind's eye, their ghostly forms crowding the plaza as they repeated their acts of devotion.

Drakalis scowled at the staleness of it all. It was all so… limited, so painfully restricted. Empty gestures devoid of meaning, made by ignorants to a powerless god that couldn't hear them. That that faith wasn't directed to true gods was an offence that couldn't be allowed to stand.

It was good that his destiny still included him leaving a mark here.

He walked toward the church, his mutating presence not enough to break the bonds that kept the place intact, but enough to allow his Daemons escorts to keep their material forms.

Drakaris was slightly puzzled by the complete lack of guards. Despite all the chaos unleashed by his minions and Daemons, he expected that a number of guatds would be always kept there to protect the church. It didn't matter anyway. Change of destiny still fell under his Master's gaze and he had more than enough power to deal with any that could come.

The great doors of the Church were inscribed with mystical incantations and sculpted with the visages of the Saints. They were powerful warding things, but the wounds operated upon them by the breaking of the wards were obvious as silver scars to those that had the sight tp see them. Drakalis uleashed his pwoer upon them with a feeling of long-waited vindication. Here the Child surpassed the three that had come before.

The doors melted and warped, the figure inlaid upon them in gold and silver melting like wax. A single bolt of power and they burst inward, allowing passage to the Warlock and the Daemons.

Inside, it was cool and silent, the flickering light of candles barely lightneing the gloom. Frescoes representing the three Saints watched from above, their gazes sad, grim and baleful. Rows of pews faced a simple altar and, beyond it, three slabs of stone, each representing the visages of ones of the Saint sculpted into stone.

Drakalis stopped, feelings of triumph blossoming into his chest. The three tombs there were but placeholders, idols that the pilgrims could touch and pray to, feeling like they were brushing the real thing. But in truth, the corpses of the three Saints were held in a crypt underground, under that same church, waiting only for one that knew where the entrance was for reach them. Once he he had blessed all three of the mortal remains under the sign of the Great Mutator, the power of faith reversed upon them would change destination, leaving the Foundry and moving to great Tzeentch. Any prayer ever given in that place would become a voice praising the All-Seeing One and a nexus of great power would be estabilished. He would channel that power to break the bonds of reality and open the path to the Beyond. Once done, that planet would be consumed by the Fire That Remake, only the first of countless to come.

The voices raised high praise for his endevour, and Drakalis basked into it, letting his own soul mesh with the glory of Change Unbound.

Bu suddenly, a warning, sharp as a blade. The tension of a thread of destiny being pulled.

Drakalis turned toward the altar, then frowned.

There was a man there, kneeling in prayer. He hadn't noticed it.

Almost like he felt the Warlock's gaze, the man interrupted his prayers and stood up, turning to face him.

He was tall, incredibly so, and robust, a column of a man. His face was made of rough features, like someone had sculpted them by stone, and from which two golden eyes watched him coldly. He had no eyebrows, his head bald and no trace of a beard, like wildfire had deprived him of them. His clothes were a simple long robe the colour of coal. In a hand, he held a long staff topped with the flaming eye of the Foundry, but, differently by the norm, two open wings encircled the symbol.

Drakaris narrowed his eyes. He knew all the people that were supposed to be in the monastery that night, name by name and face by face, but this one… this one he didn't know.

The voices hissed a warning that was a taunt that was also a frenzy of loathing. Allowing for those emotions to contamine his own, Drakaris sent his mind to probe the mind's, but his efforts met only a wall of polished steel.

"You don't belong to the monastery. Who are you, outsider?" He asked. His voice was formed by multiple echoes as he spoke, each underlying the question with a subtly different tone. Whoever that man was, one capable to stop his mind incursions deserved his wariness at least.

The unknown man stood tall as the words washed over him, echoing again and again in the naves before stopping abruptly, like a hand had hushed them.

"I have been accepted here. I belong." He said, and there was power and authority in his rumbling voice. "It's you that are the outsider here, Astur son of Narthur. You're not welcome in this holy place."

Drakalis scowled. Being called by his relinquished name angered him. "Astur is dead, fool. I am Drakalis Asterion the Heir, and i come to claim my inheritance."

The man's gaze was hard and grim. "Those names don't belong to you. They belonged to worthier souls, of which you come now to desacrate the resting places." He pointed an accusatory finger against him. "I know what you think yourself to be, and i know what your intentions here are. I ask you this: must your inheritance be one of despoliation?"

Drakalis hid the surging contempt he felt for the mysterious man behind a mask of impassibility. "Your ignorance runs deep, outsider. Not despoliation i bring, but ascension and the blessing of the Great Mutator. This church to false gods will make a fine temple to Him."

"So you will destroy everything your predecessors have built?" There was no bafflement into the man, only grim contempt.

"The limited words of a limited mind." Drakalis smirked with contempt of his own. "Change is the fondamental law of the Universe. In erasing the staleness that this place has been subjected to, i bring it closer to the Truth of the Ages, make it grander than it has ever been." He spread his arms wide. "Everything my ancestors have done is but the weaving of the thread of destiny that has brought me here this night! With my work, i will bring it to conclusion! I will surpass them all! I will bring Truth where Lies have reigned!"

"And with what right you decide that this must come to pass?"

"The right given unto me by a God!"

"And what right your God has to decide this, if we reject him?"

Drakalis actually blinked in surprise at those words. The sheer gall of this puny man! To speak such words of the Great Mutator! It was almost adorable, in a way.

"I am actually amazed, little man." He chuckled. Had he really held contempt for this fool? The only thing he was worthy of was amused pity. "It's rare to find the depth of ignorance that one man needs to speak in such ways about Gods." He shook his head, the Daemons around him tittering in reflection of his own feelings. "The One that stands behind me sits at the center of the Universe. My Master sees all and decide all, the stars themselves turn by his will. And you speaks of rights? He could decide to reap all of the souls in existence and that still would fall well beneath His divine rights." He smiled indulgently. "But i suppose that to one as ignorant as you such reasonings are beyond comprehension. Allow me to rephrase my words, then. In a way that even your tiny little mind will be able to understand." He raised an open hand. "By a side, stands the power that makes reality run like wax, the unfathomable depths of the Immaterium unbound in its purest form. A will, so great that all the galaxy is encompassed by it, that destiny itself is bent by it, before which a million, a billion, all of the uncountable numbers of humanity amidst the stars is nothing but a nest of worms, squirming into the darkness while a storm rages outside! And the chance to the worthy to be part of that abyss of endless power, to sup on a chalice offered by the hands of a God!" He clenched his fist, blue flame flickering across the fingers. His words rang into the church, echoing loudly before disappearing. "In the other hand…" He smirked. How could he not? The difference was such that even to compare the two things was laughable to the extreme. He slowly swiped with a hand before himself. "A dusty church. A mound of bones. Flocks of fools, bumbling to nothing. And, ah, the fairytales that Father Gast liked to sing to the children." He lowered his hand, the tittering of the Daemons underlying his point. There was no need for more discussion, really.

The man replied nothing. He just watched.

Drakalis was satisfied. "Enough of this." He said. "Destiny rushes and i won't keep it waiting. Stand aside!"

He made to advance, when the voice of the man, clear and heavy, resounded.

"If you dare to try and dissacrate this place, damned one, i will boil your eyes in their sockets."

Drakalis sneered. "You dare to stand against me, little man?"

The man nodded gravely. "I do. And i reject your claims. Your so-called all-powerful master has no claim over this place. This is land consacrated to the Foundry."

Drakalis snorted. "An empty idol. The Foundry is no god."

Despite he was gazing at him deeply, Drakalis felt that, for a moment, the gaze of the man moved somewhere else, to a far away place that only he was able to see.

"It will be." He whispered, and Drakalis had the impression of whispers in the air, silvery forms of something to be. He shook it off with irritation.

"Foolishness." He hissed. "I grow tired of it. Stand aside or be remade."

The man didn't answer, his eyes refocusing over him.

"Your claim is empty. It is backed only by the will of an entity whose only domain are lies and deceit. You talk of destiny fulfilled, but that destiny is only the will of an usurper that call himself master of fate and would see anything fall under his sway by force. It's not apotheosis that he he seeks, but only pervesion to his own nature, the only thing he is capable of recognizing as good. And you… you're heir to nothing. You're only a mediocre child that has failed to make his wishes a reality and now would bring about the end of those same things he wished to possess only for his refusal to accept his own inadequacy. And in doing so, you managed only to damn yourself and throw away any shred of goodness that was in your soul."

The words bit, hard and deep. Hatred, raw and beyond reason, surged inside of Drakalis. He pointed his staff against the man and, with a cry, he unleashed his power upon the one that had dared to spoke such of him and of his Master.


End file.
